Language arts teacher Amanda Snyder walks among freshmen as they work on their letters.
Handwritten letters of encouragement from freshmen at Mansfield Senior High School are on their way to residents of Texas – strangers they probably will never meet – who are suffering from the devastation of hurricane winds and flooding.
The letters were completed Wednesday and Thursday in the language arts classrooms of teachers Geneva Johnson and Amanda Snyder and intervention specialist Ellen Morris.
“We wrote letters of support to the victims of hurricane Harvey,” Snyder said. “All freshmen in every language arts class participated.”
The freshman class numbers about 250.
The letter-writing project was both compassionate and academics-based.
“We addressed the (academic) standards – grammar, punctuation and format,” Johnson said.
Synder offered writing tips Thursday as she walked around her sixth-period class, one of the last groups to finish the project.
“Write from your heart. Make it an uplifting message,” she said. “Your letter can be serious or humorous, just let them know that you are thinking of them.
“When you finish we will do our peer edit. We will separate into pairs and look at each other’s work.”
Kiarah Ross was among the letter writers.
“I just tried to express my understanding of what they are going through,” she said. “I said it doesn’t matter who you are or what you do, this could happen to anyone.”
How will the letters get to Texas and who will receive them? That’s where Morris comes in.
“This all started when I got a call from a family friend who lives in Kansas, but grew up in Texas,” Morris said. “The home of her parents, who have been married more than 60 years, was destroyed, gone.
“She suggested that our students write letters of encouragement that might help hurricane victims escape their reality, even briefly.”
Morris will mail the letters to Kansas on Friday.
“When she gets them she is going to drive to Texas as far into the hurricane-damaged area that she can and distribute them to everyone she sees,” Morris said.
Kiarah Ross knows that the recipient of her letter will be a total stranger.
“Even though I don’t know them, I want them to know that I care about them,” she said.